Management Decision

An end-to-end process of writing and publishing influential literature review

articles: Do’s and don’ts
Virginia Bodolica, Martin Spraggon,
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Influential
An end-to-end process of writing literature
and publishing influential review articles

literature review articles

Do’s and don’ts
Virginia Bodolica Received 23 April 2018
Revised 23 April 2018
Department of Management, American University of Sharjah, Sharjah, Accepted 26 May 2018
United Arab Emirates, and
Martin Spraggon
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Department of Public Administration,

Mohammed Bin Rashid School of Government, Dubai, United Arab Emirates

Abstract
Purpose – Literature reviews are essential tools for uncovering prevalent knowledge gaps, unifying
fragmented bodies of scholarship, and taking stock of the cumulative evidence in a field of inquiry.
Yet, successfully producing rigorous, coherent, thought-provoking, and practically relevant review articles
represents an extremely complex and challenging endeavor. The purpose of this paper is to uncover the key
requirements for expanding literature reviews’ reach within and across study domains and provide useful
guidelines to prospective authors interested in generating this type of scientific output.
Design/methodology/approach – Drawing upon the authors’ own experience of producing literature
reviews and a scrutiny of review papers in major management journals, the authors develop an end-to-end
process of writing and publishing review articles of high potential impact.
Findings – The advanced process is broken down into two phases and seven sequential steps, each of
them being described in terms of key actions, required skill sets, best practices, metrics of assessment and
expected outcomes.
Originality/value – By tapping into the inherent complexity of review articles and demystifying the
intricacies associated with pursuing this type of scientific research, the authors seek to inspire a wealth of new
influential surveys of specialized literature.
Keywords Literature review, Best practice guidelines, Future research agenda, High-impact review article,
Research synthesis, Writing and publishing
Paper type Conceptual paper

Owing to an ever-accelerating rate of transformation of competitive business landscapes,

organizations have been regularly confronted with a variety of new challenges that threaten
their sustainability. In an attempt to provide workable advice to corporate leaders for keeping
up with changing environmental dynamics to secure firm longevity, the field of management
has evolved in a number of different directions (Nofal et al., 2018; Linnenluecke, 2017;
Spraggon and Bodolica, 2017). Researchers have been devoting a substantial amount of time
to the analysis of micro-, meso- and macro-level predictors of positive organizational outcomes
that originate from a diversity of management sub-areas but also span across several
social science disciplines (Smith et al., 2018; Bodolica et al., 2016; Leonardi and Vaast, 2017;
Spraggon and Bodolica, 2011). Over the years, these efforts resulted in an amplified
sophistication and heterogeneity of collected data, study designs, theoretical approaches and
analytical techniques, leading to the emergence of largely disjointed bodies of literature.
In this context, it has been extremely difficult to interpret cross-study inconsistencies in
findings and take stock of the accumulated research in the field. Literature review articles Management Decision
became important tools that aim at equipping scholars and practitioners to successfully © Emerald Publishing Limited
0025-1747
navigate this heightened knowledge complexity. For scholars, these articles provide access DOI 10.1108/MD-03-2018-0253
 MD to fragmented pieces of evidence through an intelligible unifying framework build on solid
foundations of prior scientific work (Rousseau et al., 2008). By gaining a deeper
understanding of past evolutions and recent developments in a subject area, researchers are
enabled to extract multiple questions worthy of further exploration for making their own
contribution to the advancement of the field (Torraco, 2016). For practitioners, literature
reviews offer valuable assistance in making sense of a vast body of increasingly
sophisticated and often-contradictory academic writings, and generating insight for
effective organizational intervention and guidance for policy-making and implementation
(Tofan et al., 2013).
Similar to other types of scientific research, including empirical, conceptual and case
study papers, review articles have been regularly appearing in a number of outlets in the
field of management. For instance, over the past two decades Management Decision has
published many surveys of the literature on a variety of subjects such as organizational
creativity (Andriopoulos, 2001), outsourcing strategy ( Jiang and Qureshi, 2006), green
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management and financial performance (Molina-Azorin et al., 2009), talent management

(Vaiman et al., 2012) and entrepreneurship education (Wu and Wu, 2017). Selected highly
ranked journals, such as the Journal of Management, started to reserve at least one issue per
year for the publication of influential literature reviews (Ollier-Malaterre and Foucreault,
2017) that are assessed on the basis of their relevance, scope of interest, coherence and
significance for future scholarship. Ultimately, the recognition of their growing impact has
culminated in the launch of the International Journal of Management Reviews and the
Academy of Management Annals in 1999 and 2007, respectively, which are dedicated to
the diffusion of review articles exclusively. According to the 2016 edition of Journal Citation
Reports by Clarivate Analytics, the former journal is ranked 10th while the later occupies
the leading position in the list of 193 publication outlets in the management category that
received an impact factor.
Despite their elevated popularity with scholars and practitioners alike, contributing
influential literature reviews to these and other management journals remain an utterly
difficult task. While review articles can espouse a variety of different routes to focus their
analysis on aspects such as empirical findings, theoretical approaches, concepts, methods or
decades of research on a topic of interest, they have to be equally rigorous, integrative
(Rastogi et al., 2018), coherent, insightful and practically relevant. It is the purpose of this
paper to demystify the intricacies of developing literature review articles and to uncover the
key requirements they entail for expanding their reach within and across study domains.
In particular, drawing on our own experience of producing literature reviews and an in-depth
scrutiny of review papers in major management journals, we advance an end-to-end process of
writing and publishing review articles of high potential impact. By tapping into the inherent
complexity of these articles, we aim to provide best practice advice to prospective authors
interested in generating this type of scientific output.
The argument presented in the remainder of this paper proceeds along the following
lines. In the next section we elaborate on some popular misconceptions about management
literature reviews and confront them with facts. A detailed description of the proposed
end-to-end process of review articles’ development with its two constitutive phases and
seven sequential steps follows. Our analysis of the different components of the process is
accompanied with many illustrative examples of published manuscripts from the broad
management field. The contributions of the advanced process of writing and publishing
influential literature reviews are highlighted in the concluding section of this paper.

Review articles’ misconceptions and facts

Although review articles represent legitimate pieces of scientific research, several misleading
assumptions are commonly associated with writing and publishing such articles.
 Therefore, before choosing to pursue this type of scholarly inquiry, researchers should be Influential
warned against a number of popular misconceptions (see Table I). In the initial phases of literature
writing, of upmost importance is to recognize that influential review articles do not represent review articles
simple narrative accounts of the current state of knowledge in a given field of investigation.
Instead, they necessitate a critical evaluation of the extant literature and its limitations, a
thorough discussion of theory-driven insights to fill the identified gaps, and a meticulous
formulation of thought-provoking questions to guide future research endeavors on the chosen
subject area (Bodolica and Spraggon, 2015; Doherty, 2013).
While literature review articles often come under attack for being excessively long, in
reality their total word-count is not superior to qualitative studies with most of the page
length being attributed to numerous analytical tables and figures (Madison et al., 2016;
Pindado and Requejo, 2015). In spite of the fact that primary data collection is not
required, review articles necessitate a fairly significant amount of time and effort in order
to search for, gather, select, and make sense of the vast and frequently disparate literature.
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To boost the effectiveness of the entire process and secure an optimal outcome in terms of
future scholarly impact, these research undertakings should not be carried out
independently but rather in collaboration with several well-established authors within
their respective academic disciplines. Indeed, due to soaring importance and popularity of
multidomain surveys of the literature, more often than not these collaborative endeavors
are co-authored by multiple (at least three) scholars, permitting to effectively tap
into broadly diversified but related bodies of knowledge (Nicholls-Nixon et al., 2011;
Smith et al., 2018).
Contrary to common beliefs, influential review articles are relatively more difficult to
produce and publish than original research papers because they require a certain level of
maturity, longstanding expertise and an in-depth understanding of the field of inquiry
(Gomez-Mejia et al., 2011). This is why these articles do not represent the best investment for
scholars in the early stages of their career, being more suitable for well-published researchers
who are more experienced in leading collaborative projects and mentoring junior faculty.
Finally, review articles may often be favored over other types of scientific output due to
flawed expectations that they would garner a wealth of citations within a limited timeframe.
Instead, informative reviews may actually generate a large number of views or downloads
by referring interested authors to the original source of synthesized evidence. Moreover, it

Phase Aspect Popular misconceptions More accurate facts

(1) Writing Content Are mere descriptive Require critical assessment of the literature and
summaries of extant identification of future research directions to advance
literature in the field current knowledge in the field
Length Are excessively long Are comparable in length to qualitative articles
(length due to many tables and figures)
Process Can be completed in Are fairly time-consuming, especially if the analyzed
shorter periods of time literature is vast and incongruent
Authors May be effective self- Are most effective as collaborative (and cross-disciplinary)
sufficient endeavors undertakings (several coauthors)
(2) Publishing Easiness Are easier to publish Are relatively more difficult to produce (when lacking
than original research longstanding expertise in the field)
Career Represent a good Require maturity and thorough understanding
investment for early of the field (are more suitable for mid-career and
career researchers well-established scholars) Table I.
Citations Rapidly and always May take time to generate citations; or may not Misconceptions and
generate lots of citations necessarily generate lots of citations, but rather a large facts about literature
number of views or downloads review articles
 MD should come as no surprise to veteran academics that citations might take time as several
years may be needed until the analyzed field would evolve in the direction suggested by the
review article.

End-to-end process of producing review articles

In the following subsections we offer an end-to-end process of writing and publishing
influential review articles, which may be particularly useful for prospective authors in the
management field. While the advanced process is consistent with procedures employed in
systematic reviews that originated in medical science and gradually expanded to other
disciplines (Tofan et al., 2013), it is also more flexible to account for the predominantly
qualitative nature of management scholarship. The end-to-end process is composed of two
phases and seven steps, of which the first five belong to the phase of writing, while the last
two steps are related to publishing reviews of the literature. As indicated in Table II, for
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each component we indicate the key actions involved, major skill requirements, best
practices, metrics for assessment and the main outcome. Figure 1, which incorporates a flow
diagram of the entire process, offers a simplified illustration of critical idiosyncrasies
associated with writing and publishing impactful review articles.

Phase 1: writing
Step 1: exploring the topic. The process starts from the identification of the subject area for
the literature review and securing its significance and relevance. To achieve this purpose,
researchers should draw on their expertise of assessing extant knowledge, reflecting on
recent evolutions and challenging dominant assumptions in the field. These actions are
particularly useful when seeking to delimit a promising review topic and uncovering related
concepts that will be subsequently employed as key search terms. Since some areas lend
themselves well to cross-disciplinary exploration, it is advisable to verify whether the
selected topic has been previously examined from alternative perspectives. The major
skillsets associated with this step are inquisitiveness, creative thinking, ability to change
and adapt in light of the newly found evidence, and understanding of multiple fields of
inquiry that is critical for gaining additional insight on the subject of interest.
Because management reviews are mostly developmental and discovery-driven,
keeping a flexible approach throughout the entire process is important as it allows
processing fresh data, making meaningful adjustments, and incorporating novel ideas.
Another best practice advice is to select a research question of broad interest to
stakeholders in a variety of areas, which is consistent with cross-disciplinary
investigations that could be carried out effectively by multiple authors. For instance, a
comprehensive review of empirical findings on executive compensation packages
surrounding merger and acquisition transactions may be similarly appealing to scholars
and practitioners in finance, accounting, strategic management and human resources
(Bodolica and Spraggon, 2015). Influential review articles often result from choosing a
topic with high growth potential, especially when the literature has reached adolescence
and the time is right to pause, analyze what is known and suggest avenues for further
inquiry. This was successfully attempted by Audretsch (2012) who has reviewed the
growing entrepreneurship research stemming from a variety of academic traditions in
order to provide a reconciled view of what constitutes entrepreneurship and propose
viable streams for future development of the field.
To identify an attractive topic for their survey of the literature and get valuable insights
into related aspects, many scholars choose to spend some time reading the “limitations and
future research directions” section of the most highly cited empirical articles published
within the broad area of their interest. In this section expert authors pinpoint promising
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Phases (1) Writing (2) Publishing

2. Searching and 3. Studies’ 4. Literature 6. Journal 7. Post-
1. Exploring screening the assessment analysis and 5. Structuring and drafting submission publication
Steps the topic literature and selection synthesis the review and publication diffusion

Actions Read and Define search terms Use a progressive, Read the articles Decide about the paper’s structure Select the journal Disseminate via
reflect on recent and keywords multi-stage method and extract Write the draft paper Check submission networks / post
evolutions Search in different Scrutinize abstracts relevant data Make presentations at scientific requirements and on social media
Question extant sources of data and full-texts Critically analyze conferences secure compliance Update profile
knowledge Check prior reviews Assess eligibility the literature (make Take part in working paper series Submit the article Build exposure
Verify ways for Retrieve identified Solve the quality- thematic analysis) at school Read comments, (guest speaking
cross- studies’ full texts quantity tradeoff Synthesize findings Solicit and integrate peers’ revise and and consulting)
disciplinary Screen articles and Select papers for in meaningful ways feedback resubmit Write and
exploration eliminate duplicates final inclusion Identify cross- Initiate related publish related
Delimit the study patterns research projects articles
topic and
related
concepts
Skills Inquisitiveness Familiarity with and Consistency, focus Analytical and Writing skills: sense of style and Determination to Communication
and discovery ability to navigate and delivery skills cognitive skills ability to edit paper’s contents for publish the article and
Creative through databases Reasoning capacity Holistic thinking flow and clarity Openness to interpersonal
thinking Meticulousness and conviction Coherence and Ability to structure ideas logically collegial criticism skills
Understanding Attention to detail Ability to work ability to Proactiveness Responsiveness to Social media
of multiple Determination and effectively alone extrapolate editor and proficiency
fields persistence and with fellow Capacity to make reviewer Networking
Ability to scholars associations comments abilities
change and
adapt

(continued )
literature
review articles
Influential

of writing and

literature review
Table II.

articles
publishing influential
An end-to-end process
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MD

Table II.
Phases (1) Writing (2) Publishing
2. Searching and 3. Studies’ 4. Literature 6. Journal 7. Post-
1. Exploring screening the assessment analysis and 5. Structuring and drafting submission publication
Steps the topic literature and selection synthesis the review and publication diffusion

Best Flexible Iterative approach Clear inclusion and Many explanatory Relevant division of writing tasks Selecting the right Membership in
practices approach Comprehensive, exclusion criteria summary tables among review co-authors publication outlet professional
Topic with unbiased and Criteria adherence Scientific methods Optimal structure: introduction, A corresponding associations
high growth reproducible search Justified reasons for of data synthesis method (with framework), author role Integrate review
potential Combination of studies’ exclusion Framework with findings, future research and Effective peer- with teaching
Literature in various methods Review panel ( first themes or clusters conclusion review process Have an active
adolescence Clearly defined independent, then Double/triple data Respect the R&R review-related
phase search strategy collaborative work) extraction process’ deadline research agenda
Cross-
disciplinary
research
question
Multiple
authors
Metrics Peers’ Benchmark type Zero selection bias Degree of data Co-authors’ degree of satisfaction Number of “reject Citations’ count
excitement and variety of Minimal inter-rater extraction accuracy with draft on the desk” Number of reads
Positive searches to prior discrepancy (via comparison) Conference attendees’ feedback Unsuccessful Profile views
feedback reviews Effective resolution Co-authors’ and requests to get the full paper submission count Novel research
Co-authorship High volume of of disagreements agreement test Experts’ opinion Number of R&Rs ideas generated
offers from relevant literature Optimal sample size Summary tables’ Working paper views Journal editors’ Evolution of the
expert Point of saturation for further analysis prototypes and reviewers’ field as advised
researchers (studies’ overlap) wows
Test search for
topic relevance
Outcome Promising topic Pool of studies for Final sample of Framework with Submission-ready manuscript Published review Influential
for review potential inclusion studies to review coherent synthesis article review article
 Actions Skills Best Practices Metrics Outcomes Influential
literature
1. Topic
Exploration
Read, reflect,
question, delimit
Inquisitiveness,
creative thinking
Topicality, many
disciplines/authors
Peer excitement,
co-authorships
Promising topic review articles
2. Literature Search, check, Meticulousness, Iterative search, Benchmarks,
Studies’ pool
Search retrieve, screen attention to detail multiple methods volume, overlaps

(1) 3. Studies’ Scrutinize, assess, Consistency, Inclusion criteria, Zero selection/

Final sample
Writing Selection trade off, select focus, reasoning review panel inter-rater bias

4. Literature Extract, analyze, Coherence, Themes/clusters, Comparisons, co- Studies’ synthesis

Synthesis synthesize analytical skills summary tables authors’ approval

5. Review Structure, write, Writing skills, Optimal structure Experts’ opinion,

Draft manuscript
Structure integrate feedback flow, clarity (main sections) work. paper views
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Figure 1.
6. Article Select, submit, Open to criticism, Relevant journal, Journal editors’ and
Flow diagram of the
Published article
Publication revise and resubmit responsiveness good peer review reviewers’ wows advanced process of
(2) writing and
Publishing
publishing influential
7. Article Disseminate, build Communication Research agenda, Citations, novelty,
Diffusion exposure, update skills, networking prof. membership field’s evolution
Influential article review articles

opportunities for further exploration, stimulating a wealth of relevant research that may
constitute the subject of a comprehensive literature review. In their paper on knowledge
creation processes in small software companies operating in Canada, Spraggon and
Bodolica (2008) discussed a number of limitations that were addressed in numerous recent
studies in the field. A potential topic for a review article could be the analysis of knowledge
management practices across various organizational (small vs large), industrial (software vs
financial) and cultural (Canadian vs emerging market) settings.
To gauge the successful accomplishment of this initial step that should result in the
delimitation of a promising topic for literature review, we offer a number of applicable metrics.
When sharing their intentions with others in the broader research community and soliciting
professional advice, prospective authors could estimate the amount of positive feedback
received or the degree of peers’ excitement with the proposed topic. Another valuable
indicator could be the number of offers extended by expert researchers to co-author the future
literature review article. Finally, to get an extra confirmation of the topic timeliness and
relevance, it is highly recommended to perform an a priori search to assess how many papers
would fall within the scope of the review. When a very low quantity of papers is generated
through this preliminary search, the subject area may be in its infancy stage, indicating that
the time may not be right for performing a meaningful literature review.
Step 2: searching and screening the literature. The second step involves conducting a
thorough search and an initial screening of the literature on the proposed topic. Typically,
this process begins with the activation of various search functions and operators available
in bibliographic databases that could be accessed via the academic libraries’ website.
Among the key databases that are not only directly related to the field of management but
also provide a wide range of relevant subject coverage are ABI/INFORM, Business Source
Premier (EBSCO host), JSTOR, Emerald, PsycINFO, ProQuest Central, Web of Science and
Scopus. Having identified applicable search terms, scholars may deploy the keyword search
technique to generate a preliminary set of studies that are semantically connected to the
research question. Different keywords and combinations of keywords should be tried to
check their appearance in the title, abstract and full text of scientific publications.
Additional filters could be applied by specifying the type of document, study, or language,
 MD while Boolean operators AND, OR and NOT could be effectively used to broaden or restrict
the search function.
To avoid potential bias, the task of identifying relevant keywords for the selected
research topic has to be approached meticulously. Authors should consider discussing,
refining and validating their initial list of keywords with a review panel of experienced
scholars in the area of the survey of the literature. In the case of Savino et al.’s (2017)
review of empirical studies on search and recombination processes of innovation
development, this discussion resulted in 22 keywords, such as “acquisition,”
“recombination,” “capabilities,” “creation,” “knowledge,” “integration,” “elements,”
“innovation,” “generation,” “search,” and “source.” When performing the database
search using the identified keywords, it is advisable to employ various Boolean connectors
or symbols, such as ( for phrase searching), ! or * ( for root expansion purposes), and
* ( for capturing word variants). By making use of the search term “recombin*,”
Savino et al. (2017) could retrieve all the documents that include the words “recombine,”
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“recombining,” “recombinant,” and “recombination.”

A number of other valuable methods that complement the database search could point to
new papers that were missed during the prior search. The most popular is the ancestry
approach that consists in screening the reference list of the recently published articles to
find the sources of evidence on which they relied and continuing this citation analysis
procedure until no further references are revealed (Bodolica and Spraggon, 2009).
The targeted search ensues from peer suggestions of critical studies on the review topic or
from the expert knowledge of highly regarded journals that are most likely to publish
relevant research. For example, authors who aim to survey the literature on social/relational
governance mechanisms and their ethical implications may perform a targeted search in
specialized journals, such as Business Ethics Quarterly, Corporate Governance:
An International Review, Business Ethics: A European Review, and Journal of Business
Ethics (Bodolica and Spraggon, 2011). Personal requests could also be sent to leading
scholars in the subject area with the purpose of identifying appropriate working papers and
forthcoming articles.
Moreover, we recommend performing a focused search for review articles that were
previously published on the same or closely related topics. Being aware of these articles is
essential for building a solid basis for differentiation and offering a convincing justification
that warrants the conduct of a new literature review on the topic. The retrieved full texts of
all the papers generated during the entire search should be placed in a specially designated
folder and afterwards subjected to an overall screening to eliminate potential duplicates.
To be successful in this time-consuming process, researchers should possess a number of
skills of which the most important are determination, perseverance, meticulousness and
attention to detail. A good familiarity with different electronic databases is valuable as it
enhances the ability to easily navigate and produce optimal hits by making use of wild
cards, operators and algorithms.
In terms of best practice advise, it is imperative for the search process to be unbiased, for
reliability purposes, and inclusive, for securing full coverage of relevant studies. All the
search strings and other elements of the search strategy should be clearly defined and
reported to eliminate potential concerns regarding scientific reproducibility. Preferably, the
articles’ identification procedure should occur in repeated cycles consistent with an iterative
approach that necessitates reliance on multiple methods and techniques. To measure
the effectiveness of this process, investigators can benchmark the number, type and variety
of searches performed against those stated in prior review articles. The search can be
unequivocally declared complete when a sufficiently high volume of pertinent literature is
produced and the point of saturation is reached with recurrent study overlaps ensuing from
 any subsequent data search. The outcome of this step constitutes the generation of a pool of Influential
papers for potential inclusion in the survey of the literature. literature
Step 3: studies’ assessment and selection. As far as the third step is concerned, it aims to review articles
finalize the sampling procedure that began when searching and screening the specialized
literature. While the application of various search filters allowed producing a general data
set, a closer examination into the papers’ contents is required to secure their relevance for
the review. The key actions that authors need to undertake refer to scrutinizing the
literature, quality evaluation, eligibility assessment, and studies’ selection for definitive
inclusion in the sample. This process is conducted in a progressive, multi-stage fashion that
starts from a more superficial analysis of abstracts and concludes with a detailed
examination of full texts of all the retrieved articles. Papers that move successfully through
each consecutive stage are shortlisted, while those that do not fulfill the pre-established
criteria are excluded from further consideration.
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Exclusion from the sample can be driven by a number of factors, such as the study type
(empirical vs conceptual), research method (quantitative vs qualitative), firm size and
type (small vs large; private vs public), time period (before vs after a given event), and
geographical area (North America vs other regions). The assessment of studies’ quality can
be made based on the reputation of the journal where they have been published, total
citation counts, theoretical embeddedness, methodological strength, or significance of
contributions to extant scholarship and practice. This procedure commonly requires solving
the quantity-quality tradeoff, as a stronger focus on best-quality evidence decreases the
quantity of articles that could be included in the review. For instance, by screening as many
as 30 top journals by 5-Year Impact Factor in business, finance, economics, and
management categories, Pindado and Requejo (2015) were able to consider over 350 papers
in their survey of the family business governance literature.
To eliminate potential subjectivity when building the final data set, we advocate strict
adherence to clearly defined inclusion criteria and providing justified reasons for studies’
exclusion from the sample. An essential best practice advice is to have several investigators
perform this articles’ selection task independently and afterwards compare and consolidate
the results within the review panel. For this purpose, scholars should be consistent
throughout the process and focused on the task at hand, possess strong reasoning capacity
and delivery skills, and demonstrate ability to work well both individually and in
collaboration with fellow researchers. When the level of inter-rater discrepancy is low and
disagreements over papers’ inclusion are unanimously resolved, the selection bias can be
kept close to zero. In addition, the effectiveness of this step can be measured against an
optimal number of retained studies to ensure the feasibility of their subsequent analysis.
Step 4: literature analysis and synthesis. Having completed the sampling procedure, the
process continues with an in-depth analysis and synthesis of all the studies included in the
survey. This is the most cumbersome and demanding step as it involves both delving into
each paper separately and combining the widely dispersed pieces of evidence to create an
integrative understanding of the explored subject area (Rastogi et al., 2018). When analyzing
the contents of extant research, a detailed form should be devised to provide a structured
basis for critical data extraction. The purpose of this form is to summarize the constitutive
parts of each article by including relevant data for the ensuing synthesis of the literature.
It may contain information about sample characteristics (such as size, industry, nationality
and period), theoretical perspective(s) used, sources of data collection, methods of data
analysis, independent and dependent variables, major empirical findings, and key
contributions to theory and practice. This background information is then used to
synthesize the results in meaningful ways through the identification of cross-study patterns,
emerging themes, and general trends in the field.
 MD Given the significance of this step for the future development and impact of the review
article, we advise relying on scientific methods of (quantitative or qualitative) research
synthesis. They offer a means for investigators to systematically interpret empirical evidence,
detect areas of knowledge conversion, elaborate on the underlying reasons of inconsistencies,
and offer viable suggestions for improved management scholarship and practice
(Rousseau et al., 2008). Meta-analysis enables the aggregation of results from multiple
studies that tackle the same research question in an effort to increase the statistical power and
generate a more reliable estimate of the net effect (Mackey et al., 2017). However, in the case of
broad heterogeneity of studied phenomena and related measures, which is a common
occurrence in the field of management, interpretive approaches to data synthesis, such as
meta-synthesis or realist synthesis, are more appropriate. While the former allows drawing
generalizations from a set of both comparable and very different qualitative studies, the latter
seeks to uncover the conditions that make an intervention work for a specific target audience.
Another best practice recommendation is to include as many summary tables as needed
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to adequately substantiate the interpretation of data for performing a thorough thematic

analysis of the literature. Similarly to the previous step, two or more reviewers should work
separately on completing the data extraction forms that would be reconciled jointly to
eliminate discrepancies and enhance accuracy. An effective way of reporting the
synthesized findings is to build a unifying framework of overarching themes or clusters
that can be broken down in sub-categories or sub-clusters based on conceptual similarity.
For example, by integrating several knowledge management streams of inquiry, Spraggon
and Bodolica (2012) developed a multidimensional taxonomy of intra-firm knowledge
transfer processes that is composed of four different categories.
Scholars need to possess solid cognitive and analytical skills to juggle large amounts of
information, assimilate findings from the surveyed studies, and combine them with their
expert knowledge of the field to set new priorities for further exploration. They also ought to
make extensive use of their holistic thinking and ability to extrapolate to perform thematic
associations and uncover conceptual connections between various strands of the literature.
The successful accomplishment of this step can be assessed through a number of metrics
such as the summary table prototype, degree of data accuracy and co-authors’ agreement
test. By designing a summary table prototype with only 3-4 full paper entries, researchers
can pre-test its level of meaningfulness and explicitness with non-co-authoring peers who
can point to imperfections, reveal reasons of misinterpretation, and suggest modifications in
the layout and contents of the designed table. Data accuracy is achieved via comparison and
effective harmonization of independent data extraction work by multiple investigators who
should subsequently come to a mutual agreement regarding the conceptual framework to be
used for reporting the results of their review paper.
Step 5: structuring and drafting the review. The fifth step in the end-to-end process of
writing influential review articles is concerned with the effective organizing of co-authors’
thoughts and viewpoints about the surveyed literature and exposing them in the form of a
well-articulated text. The main objective is to produce a coherent and logically structured
draft of the review paper to enhance the quality of the message being delivered to the target
audience and to increase the likelihood of its future impact. This requires possessing
excellent writing skills that include a sense of style, capacity to organize ideas in an
intelligible manner, and ability to edit content for grammar, flow and clarity. Additionally,
co-authors need to be proactive in their search for peers’ feedback on the written draft and
approach the received criticism as a viable opportunity for improvement. When making
presentations at scientific conferences and taking part in working paper series at business
school or university, new insights can be generated for successfully rewording and
streamlining the text.
 Disregarding the specificity of the synthesized topic or subject area, most management Influential
review articles exhibit a strikingly similar structure. An impactful survey of the literature literature
is typically organized around five major sections, including introduction, methods and/or review articles
framework, findings, future research, and conclusion. The introduction seeks to attract
readers’ interest by raising awareness about the importance of the researched question
(i.e. step 1), substantiating the need for a comprehensive review of the evidence, and
delineating the achieved contributions for knowledge advancement in the field.
The methods section aims to report the details of the sampling procedure, starting from
the initial search strategy and screening of the literature (i.e. step 2), and concluding with
the adopted techniques for studies’ assessment and selection (i.e. step 3). The description
of sample characteristics is often conveyed in a table that categorizes the distribution of
retained articles by journal title, journal discipline, year of publication, and total
citation count, among others. The inclusion of these methodological aspects is a must for
all the papers that appear in the International Journal of Management Reviews
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(Linnenluecke, 2017; Pindado and Requejo, 2015).

Alternatively, most articles published in the Academy of Management Annals choose to
focus on the development of a conceptual model or framework that stems from the deployment
of scholarly efforts to analyze and synthesize the dispersed literature (i.e. step 4).
This framework organizes the reviewed research in different themes, streams, and sub-clusters
and is used to guide the readers through the remainder of the article (Bodolica and
Spraggon, 2009; Leonardi and Vaast, 2017). The findings section embraces the structure
advanced in the conceptual framework to discuss the emerging results from the surveyed
studies by making use of relevant summary tables for each thematic cluster. Then, the section
on future research should critically assess the current state of knowledge on the topic, discuss
discrepancies and limitations, and advance a comprehensive theory-driven agenda of research
questions that should be addressed in the next generation of studies in the field. Finally,
a one- or two-paragraph conclusion is dedicated to providing a brief overview of the review
article and inspiring additional work and further inquiries in the subject area.
Considering the complexity of devising a coherent literature review paper, we advocate a
skill-based division of structuring and writing tasks among the co-authors. A reliable
qualitative metric of the paper’s future success represents the objective feedback and
opinions received from subject-matter experts and experienced researchers in related fields.
The potential interest of the scholarly community can be estimated via conference attendees’
requests to get the full paper and the number of working paper’s views and downloads.
Since the expected outcome of this step represents the finalized review manuscript that is
ready for journal submission, the degree of co-authors’ satisfaction with the produced draft
can indicate its readiness to enter in the publishing phase.

Phase 2: publishing
Step 6: journal submission and publication. While writing a review manuscript is extremely
demanding, publishing it in a well-regarded academic journal poses an entirely separate
challenge. This step requires familiarity with a number of potential publication outlets, their
scope of coverage, type of readership, and specific submission guidelines. It necessitates
understanding of the practice of scholarly publication, including the idiosyncrasies related
to the double- or triple-blind peer review. Difficulties associated with securing timely
evaluations from expert reviewers due to their busyness and time constraints contribute to
slow turnaround cycles from initial submission to editorial decision, adding more
uncertainty to the equation. Given the multiplicity of parties involved in the process, its
success hinges upon the effective collaboration among the authors, editorial assistants,
editors, associate editors and anonymous reviewers.
 MD The most important best practice advice is to select an appropriate scholarly outlet for
publishing a survey of the literature. Submitting authors can choose between review-only
publication titles, annual review issues of general management journals, and regular
editions of more specialized management outlets. The better the fit between the journal
scope and the review article topic, the higher the likelihood of benefiting from a productive
and expedited peer-review process. Nonetheless, if the subject area of the review article is
sufficiently broad but also focused on a specific management sub-discipline, it stands a good
chance of being published in either of these journals. For instance, in-depth surveys of the
expanding family business research have been routinely included in both review-only
management titles (Gomez-Mejia et al., 2011; Siebels and zu Knyphausen-Aufseß, 2012) and
regular issues of specialized journals, such as Family Business Review (Madison et al., 2016)
and Journal of Family Business Strategy (Suess, 2014).
Another way for selecting an optimal publication outlet that should be acknowledged
represents getting informed about recent Calls for Papers as part of Special Issues
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released by a number of journals in the field. Interested authors can explore the full list of
Open Calls for Special Issue Papers on the website of major scientific publishers such as
Emerald, Elsevier, Wiley and Inderscience. Special Issues are commonly guest-edited by
subject-matter experts who delineate the scope of the issue and formulate critical research
questions that have to be answered in relation to a specific topic. A literature review article
that pushes the boundaries of scholarly inquiry on the identified topic beyond extant
knowledge frames stands a good chance of both being published and garnering citations.
The Special Issue Call for Papers on “Micro-foundations of small firm internationalization”
from Cross Cultural and Strategic Management by Emerald could be of interest to
comparative management scholars. Guest Editors are inviting submissions of various
papers, including literature reviews, that tackle the international growth of small businesses
from a comparative/cross-cultural perspective.
To enable a smooth submission and communication process, the corresponding author
should check the specific journal requirements, secure compliance with them, and inform
all the co-authors when the manuscript is under publication consideration. While awaiting
the editorial decision on this submittal, new research projects can be initiated to capitalize
on the ideas advanced in the review paper. In case of receiving a positive feedback from
the journal, the co-authors should read the reviewers’ comments, revise the manuscript
accordingly and, prior to the expiration of the deadline, resubmit it for another round of
anonymous evaluation. Of critical importance is to preserve openness to constructive
criticism and responsiveness to editors’ and reviewers’ suggestions for improvement.
The metrics that can be used to assess these publishing efforts are the number of
“reject on the desk” decisions, the unsuccessful submissions after the initial peer review,
the “revise and resubmit” cycles, and the positive impressions and encouragements of
reviewers and journal editors. Eventually, with a healthy dose of co-authoring scholars’
determination and commitment, the outcome of this step will constitute the acceptance of
the review article for publication.
Step 7: post-publication diffusion. The final step in the advanced end-to-end process of
producing influential review articles consists in various post-publication diffusion
initiatives that seek to stimulate the article’s widespread use and adoption. All the
academic journals implement a number of strategies to enhance their visibility and
reputation, such as providing open access to selected issues and offering early view
options by posting papers online ahead of print. While the prestige of a given journal is
most commonly estimated by the magnitude of its impact factor, publishing in top-ranked
outlets is not an automatic guarantee of garnering a lot of citations, and vice-versa.
As a matter of fact, there are many examples of highly cited articles that appeared in
 journals not included in the Social Sciences Citation Index, such as the qualitative case Influential
study methodology paper by Baxter and Jack (2008). Hence, we believe that it is also the literature
responsibility of the authors to deploy a number of actions to help the review article review articles
being noticed and applied.
As soon as the paper gets accepted for publication, the news ought to be disseminated
through personal and professional networks, and posted on relevant social media
platforms. The publicly available resume of each author has to be updated along
with the individual profile page on the official website of the employing institution
(e.g. school, university, research center). To spread awareness about their forthcoming
survey of the literature, researchers should increase their exposure to both the
academic and practitioner communities by building a digital presence, participating in
discipline-related conferences, delivering consulting mandates, and accepting guest
speaker and discussion panel invitations. Moreover, they could start new inquiries and
complete the previously initiated research projects stemming from the review, while
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several years later the significantly amplified evidence on the surveyed topic could
result in a renewed effort to synthesize the related literature. For instance, the original
review article of Bodolica and Spraggon (2009) on top management pay in target and
acquiring firms have been notably expanded and morphed into a full-fledged book
(Bodolica and Spraggon, 2015) to capture the evolution and the rapidly evolving
knowledge base in this subject area.
To succeed in their post-publication diffusion efforts, scholars should optimize their
social media proficiency, be great communicators, possess strong interpersonal skills and be
good at networking. Our best practice recommendations for authors are to be active
members of several professional associations, to pursue a dynamic research agenda within
the broader scope of their review paper, and to integrate the outcomes of their research with
teaching, consulting and community outreach. To evaluate the impact of the published
article, we suggest relying on both quantitative and qualitative methods of assessment.
While the total citations’ count is the most popular statistic, the number of paper downloads
and even authors’ profile views on social media may be seen as complementary indicators.
For example, the Academy of Management Annals’ website offers a regularly updated
metric on the most read papers published in the journal, which is based on the aggregation
of PDF downloads and full-text HTML views. The literature review’s potential influence can
also be estimated qualitatively by the novelty of suggested avenues for future research,
the practical relevance of generated ideas, and the long-term evolution of the field in the
direction advocated by the review article.

Conclusion
The management discipline provides infinite possibilities for taking stock of advancements
and setbacks in various areas of its dynamic and broadly diversified arena (Chen and Miller,
2012; Kalliny and Benmamoun, 2014). In-depth reviews of the literature are ideal venues for
challenging established assumptions, highlighting serious knowledge gaps, and offering
thought-provoking reflections on how the field can move forward. To be successful in their
attempts to interpret the cumulative evidence produced by a body of scholarship,
researchers need to be aware of all the requirements in terms of actions, skill sets, best
practices, and metrics for assessing the outcomes. In this paper we seek to make a
methodological contribution by developing the foundations of an end-to-end process of
writing and publishing high-impact review articles in the field of management. It is our
contention that the guidelines included in the advanced process would be beneficial to
authors interested in pursuing this type of scientific research by inspiring a wealth of new
influential surveys of specialized literature.
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Corresponding author
Virginia Bodolica can be contacted at: virginia.bodolica@hec.ca

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